The Godhead Trilogy by James Morrow
The Godhead Trilogy is a thought-provoking series of novels that explores profound themes of divinity, morality, and human existence. The narrative begins with "Towing Jehovah," where the dead body of God falls from Heaven and is towed by a disgraced captain, Anthony Van Horne, with a Jesuit priest, Thomas Ockham, accompanying him. Their journey leads them to confront various challenges, including militant atheists and a deranged re-enactment society, as they seek to understand the implications of God's death.
The second installment, "Blameless in Abaddon," reveals God's corpse to the world after an earthquake, leading to its commercialization in a religious theme park. The protagonist, Martin Candle, embarks on a quest to hold God accountable for humanity's suffering, culminating in a World Court trial where God is declared not guilty.
The final book, "The Eternal Footman," delves into the existential crisis that follows God's demise, introducing a plague of death awareness that afflicts humanity. The story follows Nora Burkhart as she fights to save her son from this affliction. Together, the trilogy presents a rich tapestry of philosophical inquiry, questioning faith, existence, and the human condition through an imaginative narrative lens.
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The Godhead Trilogy
First published:Towing Jehovah, 1994; Blameless in Abaddon, 1996; and The Eternal Footman, 1999
Type of work: Novel
Time of work: 1992-2025
Locale: Earth
The Story
In Towing Jehovah, winner of the prestigious World Fantasy Award, the body of God falls from Heaven and lands in the Atlantic Ocean. Afterward, the Vatican calls on disgraced oil tanker captain Anthony Van Horne to tow his body to a final resting place in the Arctic. Thomas Ockham, a Jesuit priest interested in cosmology, accompanies Van Horne on the voyage in order to protect the Vatican’s interests. Both are searching for something: Keith seeks redemption for his role in the colossal oil spill that decimated Matagorda Bay, and Thomas wishes to discover the answer to the question, “Why did God die?” While they fail to transport God’s body in time to preserve his brain activity, they overcome obstacles including Cassie Fowler, a militant atheist who believes the feminist cause is threatened by the body’s very existence; a deranged World War II re-enactment society bent on destroying his corpse; and a side trip to a pagan island in order to put God’s body—the Corpus Dei—to rest in an iceberg.
Blameless in Abaddon begins as an arctic earthquake reveals God’s dead body to the world and the Vatican arranges to hook it up to machines in order to preserve the newly discovered signs of activity in his brain. The Corpus Dei, sold to the Baptists, becomes the main attraction in a religious theme park in Orlando. Martin Candle’s visit to the park fails to cure his cancer, his wife dies, and suddenly this contemporary Job decides to put God on trial for crimes against humanity. Presenting testimony ranging from natural disasters to existential evil, Martin hopes to hold God accountable for the pervasive and unending torment visited upon humanity. In the end, the World Court finds God not guilty, and Martin destroys the life-support machines sustaining God’s body.
No longer maintained by machines or preserved by ice, the Corpus Dei explodes piece by piece, until only its head remains. God’s skull goes into orbit above the Western Hemisphere, and in its shadow a new plague is visited upon humanity. The Eternal Footman chronicles the existential sickness, referred to as “death awareness,” and explains that victims are visited by a personification of death called a fetch. Confronted by their mortality, most victims succumb to this “abulic plague” by losing their will to live. Nora Burkhart sets out to save her son Kevin from this deadly disease.